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There are numerous drugs, antihistamines and sprays available both by prescription and over the counter to combat the nightmares of hay fever.  As a sufferer I have tried many such approaches and I’m sure that the pharmacists have made a fortune out of it each year.

The prescribed drugs have never provided a fully satisfactory solution to the problem.  We are just left to wonder quite how bad we might have been if we hadn’t taken anything at all.

Now, let me start by saying that I’m no expert when it comes to medicine or psychology.  I haven’t even devoted much time to the study of hay fever and this is in fact the first time I have written about it (but perhaps it won’t be the last).  I am simply writing what I know about my own experiences.

As a youngster I would spend much time hiding in a darkened room while others were enjoying the sun.  I used to dread family walks in the countryside.  I would find myself concentrating on the tarmac of the road rather than daring to look at the ‘beautiful’ fields and trees that everyone else thought so wonderful.

What about the idyllic family picnic scenario?  Does your wife continually tell you to come and sit down while you are desperately trying to hold your nose and your sandwich five and a half feet above the danger zone?

Why do they put pictures of flowers and pollen on the boxes of hay fever relief treatment?  Does that put anyone else off buying it or is it just me?

What is hey fever?

Hay fever is an over reaction by the immune system.  The nose detects pollen. The immune system sees it as a dangerous foreign body and reacts by over producing histamine. It is the unwanted histamine that results in a runny nose, streaming eyes, itchy throat and generally plays havoc with everything in the sinus area.

Hay fever is not really an allergy in the true sense of he word.  It is, as we have said, a malfunction of the immune system.   The drugs we are given do not cure hay fever.  Main stream medicine has no cure for hay fever.  All the drugs try and do is suppress the symptoms.

It is my view that we have been approaching the hay fever allergy from the wrong direction and that rather than taking drugs we should instead combat it with the power of the mind.

It’s all in the mind.

I will never forget how alarmed I was the first time I got hay fever from watching the TV.  I was perfectly okay until I joined my mother in the lounge to watch tennis from Wimbledon.  Seeing all that grass made my nose and eyes stream at full flow.

Could hay fever really be one of those ailments that is just ‘all in the mind’?  I was appalled at myself.

It starts to appear obvious that the nose is not the only culprit in the scenario.  It would seem that the brain also takes its cues from the eyes.

What’s one of the biggest causes of hay fever for you?  Is it the dreaded yellow fields of oil seed rape?  Anyone educated in agriculture will tell you that the pollen grains from this crop are too big and too heavy to be air borne.  (It’s big sticky pollen that relies solely on insects for its transport).

Do people educated in agriculture get up your nose too?

Oil seed rape DOES cause hay fever!  We know very well that it does.  But lets look at it again.  Is it our EYES and not our noses that are telling our brain about the problem?  If that’s all it is then surely we can tell our brain whatever we like!

The Eureka! moment.

That’s when the big breakthrough came and things started to improve for me.  If the brain could be fooled into thinking there was pollen around when there wasn’t any then surely it could be fooled into thinking there was no pollen when there was!

So, what are we learning?  Hay fever is not a proper allergy.  You can’t rely on medicine to cure something that isn’t a proper illness.  Hay fever is a conditioned response.  A conditioned response that our brain has mis-learned and we should therefore be able to un-learn it.  Shouldn’t we?

I want to see less focus on sprays and anti-histamines.  I want to see more focus from those who specialise in the likes of NLP, hypnotherapy and acupuncture.  This is the approach that I want to start learning about.  This is the route that I will be taking my kids on if they start to suffer this misery.

It’s too late for me.  Don’t get me wrong; I still suffer.  It’s just a hundred times better than it used to be.  I’m now in my forty third year and my over-active immune system is past it’s best.  Or maybe the mind control is working.  Who knows?  As long as I believe it is fixed.